Edinburgher's balancing act

beanielou

Nothing wrong with going back to church if thats what you want.
I chant & you know what it works for me & thats all I care about

edinburgher

Cheers Beanielou - so many people are anti-religion these days that it can sometimes be a bit of a sore point to mention! There are certainly things that I found confusing/didn't agree with about my faith (I was raised a Catholic), but at the same time I get a lot of comfort from it and I certainly hang onto some belief that there's more than just the world as we see it

edinburgher

Right - up and at 'em!

Got into the office extra early, so a quick post shouldn't hurt! I love it at this time of day, I'm lucky if there's three other people on the same floor as me (open plan office), which gives me the time I need to wake up.

Have already had a coffee (decaf), but it just isn't the same. I know that caffeine is a drug, but whoever invented the process to take it out[/] of coffee was just being mean Still, I'm a heck of a lot less jittery when I don't drink two huge mugs of coffee before lunch, so all is good.

I am taking a running start at getting myself a little bit more organised and since getting up I have:

1. Updated my budget spreadsheets to hide £180/mth of savings/investments/fixed expenses so I behave myself and don't use them in one of those little emergencies that seem to crop up all the time
2. Posted off my application for a 2010/11 Stocks & Shares ISA (I'm starting off with £50/mth paid into a low-cost All Share tracker and hope to keep up the habit for 3-4 years (part of the mortgage deposit)
3. Checked my Zopa account and am pleased to see that the money I transferred in has all been lent out without complications. I quite enjoy Zopa and while it's a little finnicky I'm averaging 9.8% before fees/bad debt. Not bad for a small investment (even if it is relatively risky). Again, planning to use Zopa for another 3-4 years to begin with (money is tied in for 36 months minimum anyway)
4. Giving serious thought to starting using Dooyoo again to earn some extra money!
5. Gently pondering signing myself up for a site like PeoplePerHour to earn some extra money doing data entry, proofing or the like... Still, without sounding horrible, I somewhat suspect that these sites are full of workers overseas who can undercut me quite the thing

InaPickle

edinburgher wrote: »

Right - up and at 'em!

Got into the office extra early, so a quick post shouldn't hurt! I love it at this time of day, I'm lucky if there's three other people on the same floor as me (open plan office), which gives me the time I need to wake up.

Have already had a coffee (decaf), but it just isn't the same. I know that caffeine is a drug, but whoever invented the process to take it out[/] of coffee was just being mean Still, I'm a heck of a lot less jittery when I don't drink two huge mugs of coffee before lunch, so all is good.

I am taking a running start at getting myself a little bit more organised and since getting up I have:

1. Updated my budget spreadsheets to hide £180/mth of savings/investments/fixed expenses so I behave myself and don't use them in one of those little emergencies that seem to crop up all the time
2. Posted off my application for a 2010/11 Stocks & Shares ISA (I'm starting off with £50/mth paid into a low-cost All Share tracker and hope to keep up the habit for 3-4 years (part of the mortgage deposit)
3. Checked my Zopa account and am pleased to see that the money I transferred in has all been lent out without complications. I quite enjoy Zopa and while it's a little finnicky I'm averaging 9.8% before fees/bad debt. Not bad for a small investment (even if it is relatively risky). Again, planning to use Zopa for another 3-4 years to begin with (money is tied in for 36 months minimum anyway)
4. Giving serious thought to starting using Dooyoo again to earn some extra money!
5. Gently pondering signing myself up for a site like PeoplePerHour to earn some extra money doing data entry, proofing or the like... Still, without sounding horrible, I somewhat suspect that these sites are full of workers overseas who can undercut me quite the thing

Hey Ed, sorry for the late reply. It sounds like you've been having a good 'ol headscratch in my absence, though!

With regard to the job, my instinct would be to go for it, if getting back to Scotland is what you really want: you will be in a much better position to apply for other jobs that you would actually enjoy once you get up there, and making the move is the hardest bit at the minute. And I don't get the impression that you exactly love the job you have at the minute. If you can't get both a great job and a great location, go for one or the other, then start hunting the other!

edinburgher wrote: »

Sometimes I forget that at 27 I'm still a young guy and should be out there enjoying life, not agonising over the minutiae.

I sooo know what you mean! The thing it, though, when you are trying to get debt free, the problem is that you HAVE to analyse every single detail in order to make progress, and it can be a hard mindset to get out of.

To this end I have started trying to fit some positive changes into my routine:

1. Exercising more, a great excuse to spend even more time with the GF
2. Setting myself small domestic/adminstrative goals and making sure that I complete them when I get home from work
3. Setting short term financial goals as well as long term - after all, what are we all saving for?
4. Improving my diet (I've gone from 14st 10lbs in February to 14st 3lbs)
5. Automating my savings more (I have set up DDs for everything and have removed the columns from my budget spreadsheet so that I can't shuffle the figures about and ultimately rob myself!)
6. Making sure I make my own lunches, avoid Pret and make my own coffees
7. Drastically reduce my caffeine intake (it gives me mood swings) - have gone from 14 mugs of brewed coffee a week to roughly 5!

I'd quite like to start a hobby as well and have recently been feeling a lot like I should go back to church :T <<<--- happy clappy smiley! In retrospect, sounds a bit like a 1/3rd life crisis...

Ed, you are the male me. Except I don't go to Pret, and I don't drink quite as much coffee. And lol @ the happy, clappy smiley. If Church would make you feel better, go for it: while I'm happy that atheists can also have their say in society nowadays (something which has historically been denied them due to strict heresy laws of religious institutions), I must admit that I am starting to get a bit alarmed by the 'fundamental scientists' (and pseudo-scientists) as I call them who are cropping up around the place. I think anyone who believes in anything so wholly that they are not prepared to consider the alternative is quite scary, whatever that belief may be.

Well done on nipping your potentially destructive spending habits in the bud before they start to get any more dangerous. I think it's so hard to lose focus once you have become debt-free as the yoke has been removed from your shoulders, so to speak. However, I think it's still wise to try to maximse your returns out of your cash as much as possible.

BTW, what is Zopa?

edinburgher

Ed, you are he male me.

First things first, this is compliment of the week!

If you can't get both a great job and a great location, go for one or the other, then start hunting the other!

Hit the nail on the head there Pickle!

the problem is that you HAVE to analyse every single detail in order to make progress, and it can be a hard mindset to get out of.

The phrase 'it's the economy, stupid!' springs to mind sometimes... Having spent so long having to hold the reins I really find it genuinely difficult to relax about these things. Hopefully the automation of savings and investments will help simplify things? Trying to get down to one spreadsheet cell titled something like 'you can spend this', with everything else done automatically

BTW, what is Zopa?

Zopa is a peer-to-peer lending site where folk with spare cash to invest lend it to those looking to borrow as an alternative to bank loans. Lenders set rates on their money (typically divided up into £10 'chunks') and chunks where the rate expected by lenders meets the rate expected by borrowers are bundled together into loans. Lenders typically get a better rate than conventional savings products, but have to shoulder the risk of default by a borrower.

edinburgher

Payslip time and my wage has now dropped due to my increased pension contributions. I'm now losing £135.57 (£108.46 'real' money) a month and it's somewhat sucky!

I realise that my pension contributions (a total of 6.5%) are very low compared to many people and I empathise fully with those who say that they struggle to make ends meet without the added financial burden. Still, retirement comes early to those who pay...

As a young person, I can also appreciate why many of my generation don't bother saving anything for retirement. It might sound silly, but even a couple of years of slightly lower takehome pay seems like a bit of a burden - despite the fact that I'm aware of the benefits of starting early!

I think it means £35/mth less in my pocket, so I'll need to massage the figures somewhere to make sure this doesn't cause me budgeting issues. Thankfully this now means saving a little bit less as opposed to going hungry, so I shall just grin and bare it

Still, I doubt I'll be putting my pension payments up next year by more than 1% (civil service pay freeze). I'm comfortable with my current wage, but suspect that the election will see cost cutting across the board to reduce the deficit and no doubt that will mean less generous pension terms/salary freezes for the longer term. Never mind - at least I'm not a Greek civil servant!

edinburgher

Yay - holiday time! Payday tomorrow and off to Germany Looking forward to some bratwurst and bier!

My start date for the new post was confirmed today, two weeks on Monday. This means that I'll need to do it remotely from London for a couple of weeks, but we will now be able to travel back to Scotchland at the start of June.

Good times.

beanielou

Happy holidays

Swinstie73

Oh missed your hols edinburgher, hope you are having a fab time! Thinking of closing my diary (even though not debt free yet) so just wanted to say thanks for posting (especially the recipes)!!

edinburgher

Thanks Swinstie - all the best for the future if you do decide to stop updating! I'm also thinking of closing my diary, seems like it no longer serves the purpose it used to